"This is due to the over 100%+ cost increases the event has experienced over the last three years..."
Surf fans around the globe were elated, yesterday, when the greatest to ever do it, Robert Kelly Slater, came out of retirement for the 27th time. The 2024 Championship Tour would certainly not feel the same without the 11x cup winner failing to give a real effort in the lineup and the aforementioned fans became buoyed that life beyond the cut might be glorious.
Dark clouds, however, are forming.
In an ominous warning to the “global home of surfing,” the much-loved World Dog Surfing Championship, conducted yearly in Pacifica, California, has become too expensive to run.
Maybe.
Organizers have hustled to the health insurer GoFundMe in a valiant attempt to raise funds. Per the posting:
This popular event brings thousands of people to the beaches of Pacifica, garners millions of dollars in national and worldwide pres s coverage to hundreds of millions of viewers and readers, helps local and regional businesses, brings awareness to our rescue dog charity partners, and the event even helps local schools in Pacifica (one school last year raised over $4,500 just from their parking fundraiser during the Championships).
The event is tentatively scheduled to take place on:
Saturday August 3, 2024
Linda Mar Beach
Pacifica, CA
However, at this time the event is not officially scheduled to take place, and all of those benefits may not be enjoyed by anyone. This is due to the over 100%+ cost increases the event has experienced over the last three years as far as permits, fees, and other event requirements that the local government has requested. The last two years we absorbed the financial losses that these incurred, but we cannot do so again for a third year.
Hope springs etc. but in the meantime, World Surf League officials are certainly taking note, perhaps imagining that if the foretold Saudis don’t appear with wads of riyals beneath pristine white thobes, it can make the rounds, Bailey Ladders hard hat in hand, in order to plug holes.
How much would you donate to keep professional surfing live?
I feel you can do better than that.
Dig deep, please.
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Whats the money for? I take me mutt Slasha to the beach for a run and a surf each and every day. It costs me nuthin and sometimes Slasha gets a root as well.
What would DSS say about this and what music video from Three Dog Night might he post?
sleepwalk by jeff beck RIP
It had been a long time since i listened to that song until now. Great song!
three dog night ONE written by Harry Nielsen. my drunk uncle!
What about just pairing the dog world tour and WSl tour to save costs?
4 dog overlapping heats with the tour
imagine hassling or dropping in on a mastiff
“health insurer GoFundMe” is perfectly funny. Thank you Charles.
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A doggie tutu fairy outfit! Dogs love these, obviously..
Yeti dog bowl
Fucking things are stupid expensive. They’re nice but fr, HOW much?
Andy,s Mum?
Miso
https://youtu.be/g38hwULRoh…
I heard it was because the Canine world champ refused to go out when it was 4 ft, claimed he had parvo
back to the chalk board…
https://cdn.ebaumsworld.com…
What does Ole Yeller, this contest and the WSL have in common?
They’re all dead
Dogs are popular worldwide.
Surfing isn’t.
The wosl should buy this dog surfing game and make a TV show out of it that would no doubt become an international hit.
Human contest surfing could then ride the coattails of that popularity to reach the promised 8 million landlocked viewers…
“The wosl should…” yes indeed.
In typical fashion, they will do the exact opposite. There’s a nearly endless list of things the WSL should (but will never) do. It’s an organization doomed to fail.
The Ultimate Dogger
“This is due to the over 100%+ cost increases the event has experienced over the last three years…” – Event Coordinator Richard “Dog” Marsh
chalk THAT up!
“Heads up, WE could give two shits about some silly f’n surf contest!!” ~ ALL DOGS
making them wear a go-pro is worse than the “Cone of Shame”
Health insurer. That’s good. 😁
Never been a fan of leashless surfing.
What about when your on the beach watching a log wash in from the outside? I always get butterflies in my stomach as I start visualizing which rock its gonna hit first.
In that instance I unleash my fandom.
They’re just relocating it to snapper and cutting the Portugal German dog leg.
Dog surfing sucks but the forces that stop this are the same that kill other cool stuff. Everything has to have permits, insurance, risk management, etc. Kills any organic community event right as they get traction.
What’s wrong with dog surfing?
Some dogs like it, most dogs don’t. I watched a video of people sending their dogs into waist high shorebreak and thought there was just too many ways that can go bad.
I had a pitbull who would swim out and circle me in the lineup if she wasn’t restrained on the beach. She’d fetch tennis balls in huge swell. The lifeguards, assuming I was probably some tourist who didn’t understand the power of the ocean, would stop their vehicles and assess the situation, until they saw her swimming back through the shorebreak with her tennis ball. Then they’d shake their heads and drive on. She also did this in river rapids, and while I tried to stop her, she could break ice like a Chessie.
She died, sadly. Of cancer, when she was almost 12.
She was also a real showoff. Nothing motivated her like an audience. Once in Carmel, she had a big crowd on the beach watching her tug-of-war with another dog, for about a half hour. Then she went around to let everyone have a chance to pet her. If she had thumbs, she would have been signing autographs.
Lots of dogs actually like doing stuff like surf.
Dogs that don’t, aren’t going to do it anyway, just like people. They’re not automatons, despite the way some people try to train them.
Apart from beleaguered professional victim Tyler Wright, nobody ever surfed because they were forced to, at least for long. It doesn’t work like that.
legend, sounds like. sorry for your loss.
This is in San Francisco, where dogs get are dis-enfrannchised because humans piss and shit in their domain, and having mid-day sex on a public sidewalk is a right.
Not sure what’s more shameful: that such a thing existed, or that Chas wrote about it.
Why can’t it be a tie?
Typical WSLnjudging.
That’s ruff but nothing is fur-ever.
Dog cunts
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